Five big e-government hacks in the pipeline for 2011:

2011 Code for America Projects

They look pretty damn spiffy.

The bullet points in no particular order:

• All moved in at the Somerville house (a.k.a. the Grotto)
• +5 pts to Mass RMV for making the permit process a lot easier
• Interesting AANE reads
• CML update: the treatment is working!

For the sake of getting it all out, I’ll approach this in reverse-chronological order. I just capped off the day with a long conversation with my new roommate Maya, as we were taking out foodstuffs and dishware and looking at artwork to fill a missing spot on the mantelpiece. I think I may be the one missing her the most when she leaves in Sept, although these late night conversations are the longest (and among the relative few) that we’ve had since I met her in the earlier days of the Grotto. She brings a lot of different things to the table. Things for which, I fear, we will not find any sort of continuity with most of the people applying to replace her.

Maya’s a good foil to us weird-minded geek programmers – she loves and uses tech, but isn’t “of” it. She’s an artist and a musician and a baker and a consummate aesthete. Put new [music|art|food] things in her living space, and she will gleefully examine each one before weaving it into its most appropriate location in the fabric of the nest. She really appreciates that I have so much useful stuff to bring to the grotto; I’m glad somebody does. Ahem.

I explained to her the situation vis. my cancer and meds, because she asked, and that probably because I’d mentioned I have a drug regimen that limits personal use of my rather large liquor collection. It was an opportunity to try on some new lingo for size that I received at today’s appointment.

So far I’ve been talking a lot with people about “cellular response” or “hematologic response” when I discuss my cancer. This is how doctors look at the early months of CML treatment, when cellular imbalance is the main concern. Once the density of the various blood cell populations has been restored to approximately normal levels, long term monitoring of molecular response begins.

This means using more sophisticated and sensitive (and thus lenghthier and more expensive) tests to measure the prevalence of the cancer-causing mutation in blood cells. Known as reverse-transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (or RT-PCR if you don’t like pain) the test accurately charts treatment progress until the mutation is no longer detectable within margin of error (molecular remission).

On February 18th, I tested positive for CML with almost 100% initial prevalence of the Philadelphia chromosome. Now, five months later, that figure is down by 95%. I’m on track to be in molecular remission well before the 18-month mark doctors aim for.

I was kind of thinking the news might be even better, as Dr Friedman had talked about possibly needing to confirm a remission as of this month, with an additional test. But I’m also kind of glad it’s this way for the time being. The confirmation test is a bone marrow aspiration followed by cytogenetics. Not only is it expensive and lenghthy, it’s painful and unnerving. I rely on Atavan to get me through that shit.

So news is good, and on top of that I’m coming to terms now with being a Somervillian. Getting a resident permit for parking was a big step. Did you know: the RMV can change the address of residence/garaging associated with your driver’s license, online, in less than five minutes? That’s an e-government success story right there. Plus: All of my stuff’s now here and unpacked, and I managed to assemble a fully-working power cord once again at work Monday, so I’m back to typing away happily, not worrying that my machine will vomit and keel over from sudden lack of power. I still kind of want to find a cheap-o laptop to replace the dying D600 for home use.

Anybody want to point me at a good supplier for mid-range laptops that are not factory-installed with Windows? I think I heard EEEPc. That’s on the low end in terms of power, but might be acceptable.

Also: I read the AspBlogosphere blog from AANE. The feed’s activity is really erratic, but every once in a blue moon something interesting comes up. The Body Language of Machines is a really interesting analysis of something I, like most people, take for granted: the ability to read and react to other drivers’ intent when driving a car. I would posit that this is precisely the kind of capability that defines and validates the K/A boundary between Kanner syndrome and Asperger syndrome. A psychologist might disagree, I don’t know.

I, for one, have never had any trouble making the intuitive leap between expressions of the human body and expressions of a vehicle controlled by that body. At least, not that I remember. When someone’s hugging the lane boundary, you sense their impatience to move to the left. Same with tailgating. Things like driver eye contact and hesitation are seamlessly meshed with car signaling and positioning.

But suppose you never realized that? It’s sort of easy to imagine not being able to intuit (and quickly process) that kind of information, and what kinds of anxiety and paranoid behavior the deficiency would lead to. Maybe, if you can understand that particular failure to connect the dots, you can understand the dozens of subtler failures that characterize the autistic spectrum.

So basically, in summary, zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

/me slumps over and falls asleep

So, I’m asking around the office today, where Mandarin is the first language of several people, and opinion seems to be that Google China’s license renewal (described here and discussed here) was a win for both sides.

To break it down a little further and provide some context: Google decided at the beginning of this year that it was no longer willing to run a Chinese language search that complied with Beijing censorship rules. It had been doing so since 2006. The change came after Chinese agents reportedly hacked into Google, stealing information on Chinese dissidents as well as technical information on Google’s login system. Google’s response seemed clear enough to me. If you won’t play nicely, we’re taking back our toys.

But what’s actually been going on since March was a little unclear to me. The Google announcement spells it out fairly clearly, though. They’ve been working to relocate the Web search portion of their business from google.cn (Google China) to google.com.hk (Google Hong Kong), splitting it off from other applications like music search and text translation that could be provided locally. For several months they automatically redirected requests for Google China over to Google Hong Kong.

What made this a significant and ballsy move is that Hong Kong is a separate legal jurisdiction. The territory was restored to China by the UK in 1997, but it remains largely autonomous and has different political and economic systems. By renewing Google’s Web license, China effectively endorses their right to do search according to Hong Kong’s rules and suggests it will not prevent users from accessing the Hong Kong site. Google says this means their China search is no longer censored–I am told “less censored” may be more accurate–and so they will be pleased to continue to do business there.

There are caveats, of course. China’s Internet has some built-in filtering, but it can be overcome with a little technical saaviness. Much as GMail can be accessed over HTTPS to prevent snooping, Google search can be done over HTTPS to prevent network filters from seeing and blocking keywords. I understand China permits the former, so they would presumably permit the latter.

What does China get for allowing this? Well, the technicalities of the compromise may be important. As of now, visitors to google.cn are not automatically sent to the Hong Kong site; they have to click a link to google.com.hk when they want to do search. Other services are provided directly by google.cn. Wired and Reuters both suggested that this was a concession to allow Chinese authorities to save face. Mel once explained to me the concept of “face” and its importance in China. If it was a matter of face, then face was probably more important than any handicap that extra click imposes on google.cn as a Web portal.

That said, Google still arguably gets a lot more out of the deal than Beijing does. China doesn’t want to lose Google. Some industry figures there have stressed its importance, and the importance of a more open network, as both a source of innovation and a bridge to the West. What they worry about, I think, is a force for change that they can’t control. That could lead to turmoil, rather than growth and improved foreign relations. The fact that they’ve taken this first step is encouraging to me.

The ducks look great, and they are ready to swim. Latest word is we’ll be setting up between 3 and 6 PM near MIT’s Tang Hall. Then, the mayhem begins. If we’re not in the news come Monday then we must have done something wrong.

I’ve been too busy either living it up, or stressing over the work that needs doing, to spare a moment in a while. Let me see how quickly I can recap.

May was dominated by commencement, alumni reunions, and the raucus kickoff of Artisan’s Asylum, a new maker-space in Metro North. That project has since gained a lot of attention and momentum, and I’m proud just to say I’m friends with these people, given what they’re achieving. Whether or not I make much use of the power tools, I think the Asylum as a community is a resource with immediate value.

I’m biased, of course. More on that in a moment.

June has been largely spent with my beak in the sand, just trying to get product out the door, and being frustrated that as a result my delivery timetable hasn’t sync’d up more cleanly with everyone else’s. But even with that, and all the stress of the anticipated move to Inman Square, I can’t help but smile these days. My blood counts are holding steady and I am awash in community.

If you use Facebook, there’s a public photo album for the month of June here (at some point I’ll hopefully be putting the complete albums somewhere that allows hi-res images); you can also find highlights in my photo stream on TwitPic. June 11th is the date of the Relay For Life at CBA, one of the major ones in the Albany area. June 12th is the date I set to get my leukemia survivor tattoo at Tom Spaulding, and June 13th was this year’s capital region pride parade, to which Kate and I were spectators in solidarity. All in all it was a packed weekend, and it set the tone for the month.

I have since learned that tattoos are mostly a test of my tolerance for mess and maintenance. The first two weeks involved a lot of babying and some icky drainage. Well worth it, though.

More recently, the Asylum opened its newly-acquired main space, a massive studio near Washington and McGrath. I got in on the ground floor for the community’s first big project, the Rubber Duck Brigade. Gui has lots of photos posted on Facebook, and Olin’s Mike Maloney is covering the event through its various stages as well. Photos should be making their way to the Asylum website eventually. Basically, we’re going to show up everybody else who attends the Boston fireworks by riding in on behemoth pontoon ducks.

I love everything about this project, even though it’s requiring me to do work I am not good at. To me, it epitomizes the statement “We have lost our minds. Come join us!” which is roughly what Gui said when he and Jenn began Artisan’s Asylum. It’s wacky, it’s a chance to do something with our hands, and it will either succeed spectacularly or fail spectacularly. The most recent reports indicate success is very likely, but either would be fun and interesting.

Those of you who will be in town for the 4th of July and want to see what the fuss is about, the most recent word I know is that we’ll be putting in around 4PM from one of the Harvard/MIT boat launches, alongside Anthony’s Project Best Idea Ever crew. Look for us and I imagine we’ll be hard to miss.